


Angel on My Shoulder

by wesawbears



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-13
Updated: 2017-09-13
Packaged: 2018-12-27 17:16:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12085635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wesawbears/pseuds/wesawbears
Summary: When Jeremy doesn't know what to do, he prays. Jean doesn't know how he feels about being the subject of someone's prayers.





	Angel on My Shoulder

If there was a feeling Jeremy hated more than anything in the world, it was being helpless. He was a people pleaser, that was true, but it was more that he genuinely hated seeing the people around him unhappy. He could feel their suffering like a crushing weight, and he needed something to help prove the world wasn’t hopelessly cruel or heartless. He was that kid who gave his lemonade stand money to charity and gave up his lunch so some other kid could eat. His mama always told him his heart was too big for his own good and that he couldn’t take on the world’s troubles on his own.

Which is why it was so awful when he realized there was absolutely nothing in the world he could do for Jean Moreau.

Jeremy didn’t know all the details of Jean’s life in the Nest, but he knew it was bad, immeasurably so. Jean wouldn’t talk about it if he asked and Jeremy couldn’t ask to begin with. The hardest part was knowing he couldn’t help anyone until they were ready to let him in. So he lay in the room they shared, hearing Jean awake panicked in the middle of the night, and had to pretend to be asleep so Jean wouldn’t be embarrassed.

After a few weeks, Jeremy felt so powerless and awful that he tried the only thing in the world he could- he prayed.

Jeremy already prayed every night, for guidance and forgiveness and to remember his blessings. But starting that night, he tried to pour all of his frustration, his fear, his sadness into a prayer for Jean. It started coherent, with a plea to help Jean where Jeremy could not, to give him peace, but the words choked him and it ended with a plea, over and over: “Please.”

\--

Jean usually sleeps before Jeremy, giving him time to reflect and pray without disturbing Jean. Tonight, though, Jean is thrown out of sleep earlier than usual, throwing them both off. 

“You okay?” Jeremy asks tentatively, rolling onto his side to blink at Jean in the dim light.

Jeremy thought Jean wasn’t going to answer, but finally he said, “Nothing I cannot bear. What were you whispering to yourself?”

“I was just praying.”

Jean looked curious. “I didn’t know you were religious.”

Jeremy ran a hand through his hair. “I’m-it’s complicated.”

“What do you pray for?”

‘Everything,’ he wants to say, because there’s no good way to put into words what he wants to convey. Instead, he settles for, “Strength. Wisdom. For Him to help where I can’t.”

Jean raised an eyebrow. “You’re admitting you can’t do everything?”

Jeremy ducked his head. He doesn’t know if it’s extraordinary bravery or just his sleepiness, but he says, “I pray for you sometimes.”

It’s the wrong thing to say. Jeremy can see Jean’s face snap closed. “I don’t need your pity.”

“It isn’t pity,” Jeremy protests. “It’s-”

It’s all I can do. You won’t let me in, you won’t let me help, but I can’t just not try.

Jean rolls over before Jeremy can finish his sentence.

\--

Jean leaves early the next morning before Jeremy is up. Saying he’s avoiding Jeremy makes him feel like he’s being a petulant child, so he doesn’t admit that’s what he’s doing. He notices Jeremy staring at him from across the field with those puppy eyes, but pretends not to see. He’s not angry with Jeremy, not really, but Jeremy’s admission had shocked him and he needed to process it. Jean didn’t want anyone feeling sorry for him, especially not Jeremy. That Jeremy thought he needed it...it felt like pity, even if Jeremy said it was not. He couldn’t understand what else it could possibly be.

He called Renee at his lunch break and she listened patiently as he explained the situation. 

“So what’s really upsetting you about it?” she asked.

Jean parsed through the possibilities: not wanting someone intervening for him, believing it to be a waste of time, the strangeness of him meaning enough to Jeremy that he would include him in something so personal. 

Finally, he says, “I know he means well, but if God wanted to help me, he would have.”

Renee answered thoughtfully, “I think he wants to help, but he knows he’s not what you need right now. He’s putting it in the hands of someone he thinks can do something.”

Jean pauses to weight that. “Have you prayed for me?”

“I have.”

He nods even though he knows she can’t see. “I don’t know if it’s working,” he says.

“Prayer’s never been a magic wand to fix all your problems. It just makes the load easier to bear.”

They say goodbye and Jean heads off to talk to Jeremy. When he gets back to their room Jeremy is sitting on his bed, knees pulled up to his chest. It doesn’t match up with Jean’s ideas of captains and how they should act. He looks unsure and pensive. He hadn’t been aware Jeremy could feel an emotion that wasn’t positive.

Jeremy looks up at the sound of the door opening and Jean can’t read his face, though admittedly, Jean has never been the best at interpreting emotions. He hands Jeremy an apology coffee, ignoring the look of surprise he gets in return. 

“For being an ass yesterday.”

Jeremy shakes his head. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

“I don’t entirely know how I feel about it,” Jean says honestly, “But I appreciate the sentiment.”

Jeremy smiles briefly. “And I appreciate the coffee.”

Jean nods and sits on his own bed. He still has to work through it, but for now, the idea that two people considered him as not an afterthought, but a real person worthy of consideration was what he could handle for now.


End file.
